In a somewhat unprecedented move - at least for the
Star Wars franchise - Revenge of the Sith was released
a couple of weeks ahead of the blockbuster Summer
movie. Fans have been waiting a few years for this
story to be wrapped up, in fact, some of them have
been anxiously awating perhaps since 1977. We know
that SW fanatics hate their spoilers and some of them
are even refusing to play the game so it doesn't ruin
the movie experience. That's almost how I feel except
that I'm afraid the movie will ruin my movie experience,
but that's just me being jaded and cynical. I loathed
the last two Star Wars movies. As Simon would say
"Absolute drivel." I will see the last installment,
but only out of some almost unforgotten pact I made
with an 11 year old boy back in 77 to "see this
whole thing through." I also made that same kid
a deal which would see me bedding the once beautiful
Princess Leah Organa, but now that she's pushing 60
and looks like a bag lady, though my chances are much
better, I think I'll pass on that one, kid. Any chance
we can change that to Padme' Amidala? No? Okay, I'll
even settle for Yoda. He's less wrinkly.

As
I didn't receive an advance copy of Star Wars Episode
III from Lucas Arts, I assumed that perhaps the game
wasn't that good. I'm happy to report that it's not
a bad game at all, but it can be quite frustrating
on anything but the easy difficulty as often times
you'll be surrounded by mountains of enemies and your
force powers always seem a little shy of getting the
job done until you're much further in the game.

At
its core Revenge of the Sith is reminiscent of the
previous LOTR games by Electronic Arts. Cutscenes
fast forward the plot and the gameplay lets you trudge
through it. The story obviously follows the events
of Episode III (and fleshes them out) which as we
all know involves Anakin's acceptance of the dark
side.Oh I should mention, I'll keep this review as
spoiler free as possible. Anakin becomes Darth Vader!
R2D2 has a 70 year old midget inside of him! Natalie
Portman is hot! Hayden Christensen can't act! Oops.
Sorry guys. I promise I'll try harder.

Once
you fire up your system, you'll tackle the aforementioned
hordes with Anakin and Obi Wan. As you fight along
side an AI controlled partner, you'll switch back
and forth between characters (preset) earning experience
points which you can use to enhance either your force
abilities or fighting combos up to 3 different levels
depending on your fighting style. As I said, be prepared
for a fight. While the first few levels are a cakewalk
(and an extremely linear cakewalk at that) you'll
eventually reach a boss battle with Lord Dooku who
will kick your ass so hard repeatedly, if given the
choice between playing the battle again or making
out with Jar Jar Binks, you'd be locking lips with
that dreadlocked CG creation before you could say
"Xenosexual". From that point on it doesn't
get any easier or much different. You'll arrive at
the inevitable boss battles against characters you
might not have been expecting to fight. But that's
all I'll say. The levels are linear, meaning there
is one way in, one way out, which felt a tad limiting,
but understandable considering we are playing the
movie. It would have been nice to have had a little
more freedom. There's nothing that says taking some
artistic license is against the law. For the videogame
medium, it should be encouraged.

The
game controls quite well, but there is a learning
curve involved that might take some quite awhile to
become completely accustomed to, especially when attempting
to pull off special moves. While it might be one's
first instinct to rush out into battle and slice and
dice, executing fancy backward flips and other sabre
throws, let me just say that you won't get far without
the block button, which also acts as a lock on. The
only problem with the lock on feature is that it has
a predilection of locking on anything that can be
interacted with; and it's not limited to enemies.
Often times in the heat of battle you will find yourself
locked onto an object rather than your adversary which
leaves you completely wide open for attack - and attack
they will. Trying to quick release the lock to face
the enemy sometimes ends with you locking onto a closer
object, which again leaves you unprotected. The block
feature (mapped to the L1 button) can also be used
to in conjuction with the R analog stick to deflect
blows and projectile attacks. The execution is quite
good, although timing is of the essence; it's not
a catch all and won't stop everything, which adds
a touch of realism.

Visually
the game is a robust picnic of cool battle animations,
jumps and fighting combos which should easily please
SW fans. The characters look good and the levels are
crammed with lighting effects and other details. While
not particularly earthshattering, the entire visual
presence of the game is more than wholly adequate.
Various scenes from the movie have been incorporated
(well, duh!) and since I'm on spoiler alert (and haven't
seen the movie) I can only surmise that Lucas Arts
would have instructed the developers to make it as
close to the film as possible. I sure wasn't expecting
that boss battle with General Grievous in McDonalds,
but that's product placement for you.

Along
the course of the game you will unlock bonus battles
which allow you to play as other characters in various
scenes from the past movies (again, no spoilers).
While these are certainly a welcome addition, consider
them bonus material and not exactly completely fleshed
out levels. Once they're over there really isn't any
reason to tackle them again. Lucas Arts also included
a coop mode (one player/AI or two player) which isn't
quite as exciting as it sounds as you can't play through
the entire game with a partner, only 4 select levels.
The multplayer duel mode is a two player fighting
contest which can be played alone or with a player
2. Initially the entertainment value seems quite high,
but it soon becomes painfully apparent that the cool
levels you are fighting in are lined with the same
invisible walls present in the rest of the game. While
the environments display a decent amount of destruction,
once you play through all of the characters a few
times the attraction will wear off. More characters
to choose from would have been welcome, but you'll
find that the selection does allow for a couple of
fantasy battles....

Purveyors
of the Clone Wars animated series will recognize the
majority of voice talent in the game, most notably
Mat Lucas as Anakin and James Arnold Taylor as Obi
Wan. It's too bad that for a project of this magnitude
Ewan McGregor and Hayden Christensen couldn't have
reprised their roles, but at least the voice talent
has been connected to the source material in the past.
John Williams orchestral soundtrack is present and
accounted for with extra musical flourishes provided
by Mark Griskey.

Your
satisfaction with this product will be in direct proportion
to your love of the source material. It's a pretty
straightforward attempt at letting you play out some
of the events from the movie(s) and you have to treat
it as such. It's not nearly as ambitious as Pandemic's
Star Wars Battlefront or BioWare's KOTOR series, but
it manages to provide the player with force powers
and light sabers and does an admirable job at entertaining
one or two players for a few hours. If you're a casual
SW fan, I'd suggest a few nights rental. If you need
to own everything SW, then there probably wasn't any
reason to read this far down the page. The single
player game is low on replay value, but you'll gain
some extra mileage out of the coop and duel modes
at the very least. Just how much extra play value
depends on if you have a bumper sticker on your car
that says "My other vehcile is an Imperial Tie
Fighter".